Computers for Kids
New program puts Duke computers in Durham classrooms
Monday, July 24, 2006
Durham, N.C. -- For 10-year-old Tabria Miles, Albert Einstein and Leonardo da
Vinci are more than just names in a history book. They are
intelligent and fun - just like her and her classmates at E.K. Powe
Elementary in Durham.
“We did a slide show of them on the Internet,” said Miles, a rising sixth-grader. “I gave Albert Einstein a weird laugh, and da Vinci was loud.”
The opportunity for Miles and her classmates to develop a personal connection with historical figures was made possible through the new Duke Computer Exchange Program, which recycles Duke computers for use in Durham schools and community centers.
The program was developed by Community Affairs and Procurement Services to enable Duke faculty, staff and students to donate computers replaced by newer machines. In addition to supporting academic pursuits of students in the community, the new process for collecting and distributing the machines supports and assures information security and Duke’s environmental stewardship.
| Replacing your computer? Duke faculty, staff and students can arrange for free pick-up of computers being replaced or removed from service by calling Procurement Services at (919) 681-5900. |
“We have stringent guidelines regarding the confidentiality of
patient information and other sensitive data,” said Jane Pleasants,
assistant vice president for Procurement Services
and Supply Chain Management. “We assure the hard drives are
completely wiped clean before donating the computers.”
David Stein, Education Partnership Coordinator for Duke Community Affairs, said the 80 computers that Duke donated last year is just a start.
“There are an estimated 3,000 outdated computers in DurhamCounty schools that need to be replaced,” he said. “If everyone at Duke donates their computer through this program, we can really make a difference.”
Under the new program, all departments that replace or remove Duke computers from service must contact Procurement Services to ensure that confidential information is removed before the machines are donated or appropriately destroyed.
“We found wide differences in how staff and students disposed of computers at Duke,” Pleasants said, "so we wanted to ensure that Duke information was being sufficiently removed and hard drives cleaned before they were either resold or given away.”
Treva Fitts, science specialist at E.K. Powe, said the computers are like new. “They’re fast, and we can use them for research, data processing, and to search the Internet to get information quickly.”
Just like with the Einstein and da Vinci computer project, the technology helped Miles and her classmates connect with school work.
“We did a whooping crane project when the cranes were migrating,’ Miles said. “We were tracking them on the computer, and we talked about them and typed about them. We wrote a story on the computer about if we were whooping cranes.”
